Armley: Community comes together for street art competition

By Joanne Gittins

Meeting out of the Unity Community Hub in LS12, an enthusiastic action group of parent and community volunteers from Dixons Unity Academy and Whingate Primary School with nearby residents have launched a community street art competition.

The students at both Dixons Unity and Whingate have been creating artwork with the theme ‘community’.

Designs will be painted on as many street cabinets as possible by the famous Burley Banksy, who has done similar street art in other communities such as Bramley, Burley, Kirkstall and Rothwell! 

With all student entries now in, the competition was launched publicly this weekend with students, families and the local community being asked to choose their favourite designs. A Facebook video with Principal Ash Jacobs and Councillor Adrian McCluskey (Lab, Farnley & Wortley) is here.

The community are being asked to go to the original post, watch the video and vote for the number of their favourite design. 

The street cabinet art will be a visual display of togetherness and joy with the two school communities at the centre. This is just one example of many ways Dixons Unity Academy, part of Dixons Academies Trust, are celebrating the local community of LS12. 

Despite being situated on the same street in LS12, the two schools fall under different wards. The street art competition is being supported and funded by the six local councillors across the two wards – Armley and Farnley & Wortley.

This makes it a collaborative project, connecting two different schools, two ward boundaries and two different political parties, showing how connected our diverse community can be. 

The Unity Community Hub at Dixons Unity Academy already supports families with a weekly community cafe space, food pantry, uniform exchange, signposting for family support, benefits and employment advice and hosting a varied range of social activities. 

The Unity Community Action Group inspire each other to make the community around the school a better place, currently focusing on traffic safety, air quality and making our streets joyful, clean, and attractive.

Through these ideas and connections, they’ve already; 

• Collected over 100 bags of litter in community litter picks
• Become an official Clean Up Hub sponsored by Litter Free Leeds and Clean Up UK. Dixons Unity can loan litter picking equipment (given to us by Clean Up UK) to other groups or individuals. 
• Supported the schools in reviewing safer traffic measures and parking resulting in a new zebra crossing outside Whingate Primary. 
• Spread awareness on air quality and impact of ‘engine idling’ 
• Involved children and young people from both schools in leading and driving ideas for change.

You can read more about this on the Dixons Unity website.

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